Abstract

We present a technique to test the frozen flow hypothesis quantitatively, using data from wave-front sensors such as those found in adaptive optics systems. Detailed treatments of the theoretical background of the method and of the error analysis are presented. Analyzing data from the 1.5-m and 3.5-m telescopes at the Starfire Optical Range, we find that the frozen flow hypothesis is an accurate description of the temporal development of atmospheric turbulence on time scales of the order of 1–10 ms but that significant deviations from the frozen flow behavior are present for longer time scales.

References

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aNl:
Number of layers identified in a data set. The fact that more layers can be identified in the 3.5-m data than in the 1.5-m data is due to the higher signal-to-noise ratio of the 3.5-m autocorrelation. The relative layer strengths, Ci2(0),
of each identified layer are given below the wind velocity, vw,
of the respective layer. t50
and t90
are the time during which the cumulative autocorrelation stays above 0.5 and 0.9, respectively.b There is evidence that this very strong layer consists of two or three individual layers moving with similar velocities.c The very fast layers move across the telescope aperture too quickly to obtain reliable measurements of their relative strengths.